It’s hard to meal plan for December. Not impossible, but harder than it should be. With the big Christmas/New Year’s celebrations happening at the end of the month, there’s effectively a full week — at least in our lives — that goes all loosey-goosey in terms of where we’ll be, when, with whom, celebrating what. So when I look at December and planning, I think about things like pantry staples, easy meals, and fallback positions, rather than fully realized menus. I don’t plan a dinner for every night of the week between Christmas and New Year’s; rather, I plan a couple of possible meals, relying mainly on stuff I know will be in the freezer and cupboards, with the full knowledge that there’s no way I’ll be cooking every single night. I also know that it’s a time to relax and let go of the plan a little bit, and to revel in the idea that I’ll have some time off (J. and I don’t work during that week) to take a deep breath. If I need to go out and pick something up for dinner at a moment’s notice, I can.

Here’s what the month will look like, dinner-wise; I can’t believe that we’re already hurtling headlong towards 2011. It’s absolutely mind-blowing to be planning what we’ll be eating in the last few days of this year.